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Month: May 2013

May has arrived and so has spring in upstate NY! This month’s querent is a woman we will call “Tara”. She is awakening to signs of a quest are blooming all around her. Tara has been struggling to find a way to express her creativity through work. A very spiritual person by nature, Tara has been receptive to signs all around her that are urging her to pursue a personal quest. She has asked for help identifying the nature of her quest and preparing for this life transition.

The first card selected is the only Major Arcana chosen in her reading. It is the World card and is the final card in the tarot deck. The World is significant and indicates Tara is in a pivotal phase between accomplishment and new beginning. Tara may be experiencing internal restlessness knowing life has brought her opportunities to excel and advance, but that she has taken her past experiences to their maximal conclusion and a major change is just on the horizon. Like a college senior in their final semester, Tara is on a quest to gain the tools and knowledge she needs to advance herself and will then be called upon to launch her new identity and develop her new lifestyle. She will have to make some sacrifices for this quest. It seems that were things to stay as they are, Tara would be recognized as competent, capable….but stuck. It is going to become more and more evident to her that she has outgrown her surroundings and even some aspects of her identity.

In particular, there are four qualities; the four elements, four talents, or four interests, that Tara has developed mastery over and now needs to harness, balance and combine to launch her new lifestyle. Her quest involves honing in knowledge and interests already developed, but further refining, polishing and presenting them to others. Likewise, her passion and motivation has carried her far but at this stage the quest is asking her to channel this motivation to back up the message and knowledge she carries. Her emotional and nurturing side will help her cultivate relationships in this new aspect of her life and it will be important for her to moderate intensity of her desire with the finesse to draw the influence of others who will help her start this new phase of her journey. Finally, the fourth quality, the stable, grounded and structured framework which Tara must remain connected to in order to see her new lifestyle blossom. It seems balance and coordination are indicated. Tara is being asked to expand her horizons and will have to modify her expectations, continually rebalancing these four qualities along the way to show her best capabilities and develop her fullest potential. The quest will have come to full fruition within three years. The first phase is the gathering of awareness and information, the second is collaboration with others and this phase may require some compromise and sacrifice of personal vision to embrace the power of opposites, the third phase will require movement, action and expression of her creativity through the mundane world. The final phase will involve transcendence, movement above and beyond what she had initially expected.

She is also facing a significant ending, as all major beginnings must first see the clearing away of previous structures and framework. There may be aspects of the quest that will show Tara what potential lies before her so that she will not need to give such power to elements of her current routines that bring security and stability. She awaits opportunities for expansion and growth on a significant spiritual level although this will be enacted through her work in the mundane especially in nurturing four paths or four talents. It seems the time has come for Tara to embrace expansion by harnessing four talents or four influences in order to promote abundance in her new path.

The next card is the Ten of Swords. This is drawn to indicate a helping or guiding force and this card shares the significance of ending, culminating events or finality indicated by the World. The variation here is that mundane situations and people on the physical plane are represented and the indication is finality, but also rest, compromise, and a necessary albeit difficult termination. Tara has faced a long journey recently but her many hardships are also guiding forces in disguise. Amidst her trials she has found connections that have helped to motivate and prepare her. She will soon face a pivotal turning point. It will arise out of an ending or completion which feels exhausting and may even feel like a failure or defeat. Tara would do well to refrain from thinking in terms of loss and defeat. She has not lost, she has simply discovered that many of her previous pursuits brought more challenge than reward and she will be given the opportunity to put to rest a burden that she has long carried. Closure is needed in order for her new beginnings to emerge but this means laying down the burden of strife, and resolving acceptance of where she stands and what she has accomplished and gained in the process.

From this point she will be helped by an honest and open confrontation of her inner demons. An appraisal of her strengths, weaknesses and motivations will be necessary. This quest may also present more guidance and help from subtle, unseen or receptive sources than projective, active, tangible ones. By remaining open to the synchronistic opportunities even if they do not fit her plans at first, Tara will be guided and helped along her path. Those of a fiery temperament or active, inspirational, passionate nature will also be likely allies. There may be one particular friend or acquaintance who stands out as a significant assistant helping Tara to unburden her spiritual and physical load. The number ten will also be important. Ten months may be required for this path to unfold or the numbers ten or one surfacing along the way should be considered significant. The culmination of past actions will bring closure rather than bearing desired fruit, yet this closure is what will allow transcendence, moving forward having learned lessons stemming from long past. A release will be found in this quest, relief of a burden, happiness that a difficult trial has resolved. Helpful forces exist along the way but the overall theme is lessons through recognizing the role of choice, action and will in both creating and overcoming hardship and difficulties. Lessons from the past pave the way for the future. The spirit needs to be recharged and refreshed in order to pursue the future free of past burdens. It is advised that Tara attempt to use the imagery of fire to cleanse and clear past negativity, preconceived notions, and residue both from spiritual, personal and mental space. Tara would do well to close the door on the difficult path of swords by allowing herself to shed the skin of the fiery suit, allow the closure of the ten of Swords to return her to the vigor and energy of the Ace of Swords, the essence of motivation and action, that her spirit will be rejuvenated and move to the next phase in progression, the physical, earthy manifestation of Pentacles.

Finally, in looking for the source of challenge along the quest, the Six of Swords is drawn. It seems a resolution to a long standing issue is on the horizon, a journey now represented in somewhat physical forms- travel, change of scenery, movement and setting sights on new horizons all in the effort to start over renewed. It seems Tara will be accompanied by loved ones or at least will journey with their support. It seems that a change of scenery across or alongside water brings a brighter future, a positive resolution found by change of scenery and atmosphere. Tara may feel as if she is shortchanged or compromising, but it seems this is a necessary step in releasing her from the tension of the path she has been on. There may be some difficulty involved in travel or fear of unknown or unfamiliar surroundings that at first prohibits Tara from accepting this change. The Six brings resolution, relief and reconciliation. A reconnection to her personal past may be indicated here as well, even a compromise that allows her to heal connections to past friends or family so that she can continue into her future with full healing and reconciling of differences. Taken in total, it seems Tara’s quest is here to bring resolution and closure and so a natural grieving process may be taking place as Tara moves farther away from her past measures of security and identity, allowing the foundation she has laid and lessons she has learned to help her accept a change of scenery involving some compromise in plans or expectations but overall accomplishment and momentum forward where she has recently been stuck in transition finalizing one phase and awaiting another.

Best of luck to Tara on her quest. Remember, no matter where you are reading this, in accordance with NYS law all readings are intended for entertainment only.

Interested in being the Querent in next month’s column? Contact Angela at Trionfi78@gmail.com.

About Angela Kaufman:Angela Kaufman has been exploring divination through Tarot cards for over a decade. She is a Certified Professional Tarot Reader and formed Moonlight Tarot in 2009 which would become Moonlight Tarot LLC in 2010. Angela uses the Tarot to assist clients in exploring personal growth and development, and in accordance with New York State Law offers readings for entertainment purposes. Angela began providing readings on a professional, “Moonlighting” basis in order to provide affordable readings to those seeking guidance, inspiration and fun. Angela is also co-author of the new book “Wicca, What’s the Real Deal? Breaking Through the Misconceptions.” (Schiffer Publishing, 2011). In 2006 she joined ISIS Paranormal Investigations and has accompanied the team on numerous investigations in private residences and businesses throughout the capital region, Adirondacks, Vermont and Massachusetts.

Perhaps you have the impression that meditation is hard to do. It must be for a gifted few with orderly, peaceful minds, right? Nothing could be further from the truth. Meditation can be easy for anyone. In fact, as you’ll soon see for yourself, it has to be easy or it won’t work.

Yet this principle appears to contradict common sense: to achieve anything of value in this world requires effort. Just look around. Humankind’s greatest achievements — in science and technology, in building corporations, in the creative arts — have been the product of effort. And those who made the effort to discover, build, or create those achievements also made the effort to acquire the knowledge necessary to excel in their fields. When it comes to meditation, however, the only effort required is to make the time to do it. Granted, this can be a challenge in our busy, achievement-oriented society, but once you’re actually sitting down and you close your eyes and begin, no effort is required. In fact, effort at that point will land you further from success.

Why does effort yield positive results in nearly everything except the process of meditation? Simply put, achievement in the world is in the field of action, in the field of doing; meditation is in the field of being. Meditation is about doing less and less until you are doing nothing, simply being, abiding in the core of your innermost Self. At that point, the ego-mind, which is accustomed to always doing and trying, has temporarily dissolved. This is why meditation is effortless, why it must be effortless: the ego-mind can’t dissolve itself by doing. Doing only keeps it intact.

In this respect, meditation is much like falling asleep (another common case of shifting from the waking state to another state of consciousness). Consider what happens every night when you go to bed. You turn off the lights, lie down, and after some time passes, you fall asleep. When it comes, sleep comes effortlessly. Other than setting up the proper conditions for sleep — turning off the lights, lying down comfortably, and so on — you can’t do falling asleep. In fact, as every insomniac knows, the more you try to fall asleep, the more surely you will lie awake tossing and turning. Only when you completely forget about trying to fall asleep does sleep come.

The same holds true for meditation: making an effort to meditate only interferes with the process. You will have the best meditation when you approach it with the innocence of a child falling asleep. The child is simply tired, and so nature takes over and sleep comes, with ease. As Christ said, the kingdom of heaven is within you, and you must be as innocent as a child to enter it.

Throughout our lives we have all learned to make an effort to one degree or another in order to achieve our goals. This may bring us success in the world, but not peace or fulfillment. For fulfillment, both the inner and outer aspects of life need to be full. We must become as expert in the field of being as we are in the field of doing. This will not only bring inner peace and well-being, but it will also allow us to tap our full creative potential to be even more successful in our active lives.

About Ajayah Borys:Ajayan Borys is the author of “Effortless Mind”. He has traveled the globe exploring human potential practices. The host of Mind Matters Radio on Alternative Talk Radio, he teaches workshops and retreats on meditation and spiritual relationships near Seattle and in the Himalayas. Visit him online at http://www.ajayan.com

We are all called upon to cope with hiccups and hurricanes in our lives — losing our wallet and car keys, discovering mold in the bathroom, missing three days at the office to care for a sick child — and we do. We are resilient heroes in our own lives every day as we skillfully navigate the disruptive, unwanted changes of the washing machine going on the fritz or the car needing a new transmission.

Occasionally we have to respond with grace under pressure to greater troubles and tragedies: infertility or infidelity, a diagnosis of pancreatic cancer, losing a job, a son wounded in combat overseas.

The way we can bounce back from such everyday disappointments and extraordinary disasters is through resilience – capacities innate in the brain to respond to the inevitable twists and turns in life flexibly and adaptively.

Modern neuroscience is revealing how we can harness the brain’s capacities of neuroplasticity to rewire our habitual patterns of response to strengthen what I call the 5 C’s of coping:

1. Calm: You can stay calm in a crisis.

2. Clarity: You can see clearly what’s happening as well as your internal response to what’s happening; you can see what needs to happen next; and you can see possibilities from different perspectives that will enhance your ability to respond flexibly.

3. Connection: You can reach out for help as needed; you can learn from others how to be resilient; and you can connect to resources that greatly expand your options.

4. Competence: You can call on skills and competencies that you have learned through previous experience to act quickly and effectively.

5. Courage: You can strengthen your faith to persevere in your actions until you come to resolution or acceptance of the difficulty.

More than 80 exercises in Bouncing Back allow you to do this rewiring safely, efficiently, effectively. The tools and techniques drawn from mindfulness practices and relational psychology create and accelerate brain change and strengthen the parts of the brain we need to cope. You recover a deep resilience and well-being that will last a lifetime.

An example:

Keep CALM and Carry On

The fastest way to regulate the body’s stress response and return to a sense of calm is to activate the release of oxytocin in the brain. Oxytocin is the neurotransmitter of safety and trust and is the brain’s direct and immediate antidote to the stress hormone cortisol. Oxytocin can be thought of as the neurochemical foundation of resilience.

The fastest way to release oxytocin and mitigate stress is through safe touch in a soothing relationship. Fortunately, neuroscientists have demonstrated many times that even remembering or imaging someone we love and by whom we feel loved is enough to release small but regular doses of oxytocin.

Exercise: Hand on the Heart

We come into steady calm by experiencing moments of feeling safe, loved, and cherished and letting those moments register in our body and encode new circuitry in our brain. This exercise offers a way to evoke those feelings.

2. Once that’s steady, call to mind a moment of being with someone who loves you unconditionally, someone you feel completely safe with. This may, of course, be a partner, child, or parent; but if the dynamics of those relationships are complicated and the emotions mixed, you may choose any true other to your true self: a dear friend, a trusted teacher, a close colleague or neighbor, a therapist, your grandmother, a spiritual figure like Jesus or the Dalai Lama, or your wiser self. Pets are also great for this exercise.

3. As you remember feeling safe and loved with this person or pet, see if you can sense in your body the positive feelings and sensations associated with that memory. Really savor a feeling of warmth, safety, trust, and love in your body.

4. When that feeling is steady, let go of the image and simply bathe in the feeling itself for thirty seconds. Savor the rich nurturing of this feeling; let it really soak in.

The Neuroscience:

Breathing deeply, gently, and fully activates the calming branch of our autonomic nervous system, the parasympathetic branch. The parasympathetic modulates the body-brain’s fight-flight-freeze response when we feel threatened or agitated. Breathing, or pranayama, has been a core practice in yoga and meditation to relax the body and steady the mind for over 3,500 years.

Breathing positive emotions into the heart center steadies the heart rate, restoring the equilibrium of the body so that we can remain present and engaged. In evoking a memory or image of feeling loved and cherished, we evoke a sense of safe connection with others; the oxytocin immediately
reduces our stress. That evocation also activates the prefrontal cortex, which triggers the hippo-campus to search for explicit memories of moments when we have been held, soothed, protected, encouraged, believed in, times when we have reached out for help and received comfort and support

Through safety and trust in connection, we come back into our baseline equilibrium. From there, with our higher, thinking brain calm and alert, we can mobilize quickly, act skillfully, and take care of business.

About Linda Graham,MFT:Linda Graham, MFT, is a licensed psychotherapist and meditation teacher in full-time practice in the San Francisco Bay Area. She integrates her passion for neuroscience, mindfulness, and relational psychology through trainings, consultations, workshops, and conferences nationally. She publishes a monthly e-newsletter, “Healing and Awakening into Aliveness and Wholeness”, and weekly e-quotes on resources for recovering resilience, archived at www.lindagraham-mft.net.

For most of my life my female heroes were fictional. Seriously. Right into adulthood. I don’t know if it showed a lack of worldliness on my part (it probably did), but I’m a product of equal parts movie, television, and comic book women. However all of that changed when I saw the “Cancer” episode of “Penn & Teller’s Bullshit”.

That episode featured a woman named Barbara Brenner who represented an organization called Breast Cancer Action. She was bold, witty, and really didn’t seemed to care that she was on television. You could tell that what she was saying, she would say whether the camera was on or off. That got me to investigate Breast Cancer Action.

Those of you who have read this site for a while know what happened, I became a vocal supporter of the organization. Every October I highlight Breast Cancer Action’s Think Before You Pink campaign and I also will occasionally post about other important work that they’re doing. This is all because of Barbara Brenner, who became my first real life female hero. Because of her Breast Cancer Action’s work was above reproach and they are able to speak truth to power.

Brenner, already having overcome breast cancer, left Breast Cancer Action in 2010 after being diagnosed with ALS (amyotrophic lateral sclerosis), more commonly known as Lou Gehrig’s disease. Even when she lost the ability to talk, she used text to speech software so her voice could be heard. She quickly became a known figure in the ALS activist community and still stayed involved to a certain extent with breast cancer issues as well. She started her own blog “Healthy Barbs” where she discussed her challenges.

Barbara Brenner passed away on May 10, 2013. And again, and again, I found myself asking, what can you say when your hero dies? Then at once I knew.

Hagfish Slime — the New Silk?
Seriously, the hagfish (which is neither hag nor fish) is a bottom-feeding vertebrate that exudes a nasty slime when threatened. Scientists are exploring ways to duplicate the fibers that are part of this slime to create a pseudo-silk with more in common with spider silk than traditional silk. Such as being super-strong.

The Anti-Drone Hoodie
I see this thing and can only think: The Latest Fashion in Cult Robes. Every drone-avoiding cultist should have one.

How Far is it to Mars?
Handy website that graphically displays how far it is from Earth to Mars, although no information about whether they use an average distance or whether they’re savvy enough to calculate Mars’ position and update their info.

Decoding Our Dreams — Using Science!
Scientists have developed a program that helps decode images of brains taken while the subject is asleep. It isn’t exactly reading our minds via machines, but it’s interesting.

3D Camera with Range
Oh sure, 3D cameras — nothing new. Only this one uses lasers and has a range of 1km. Oh, and it’s not so good at human skin, so don’t worry that people are snapping your 3D picture from a thousand yards away.

Attack of the Magnetic Putty!
Take iron filings, silly putty and a rare-earth magnetic. Mix. Then film it using a time-lapse camera. Result: cool but kinda creepy.

Sugar Water Modeling Yellowstone
Scientists wanted to model the tectonic behavior of the vulcanism and other geologic movements of the area around Yellowstone and the Western US in general. So they got a huge tank and filled it with sugar water.

The Time Capsule Apartment
Wealthy woman leaves her Paris apartment just as the first rumblings of WWII break out. She went to the South of France, and continued to pay rent on the sealed apartment for the next 70 years, until she died at the age of 91. Her heirs discovered it, opened it and these pictures are of what they found there.

Anti-Gravity
Anti-matter, anti-gravity, CERN — this article has it all! You know it’s real science when no one says “we’ll have flying cars in 10 years!”.

Secret Tunnels of the Mafia
No, not a Weekly World News article — the Mafia in Sicily (and other parts of Italy) really do have secret tunnels, bunkers and various bolt-holes.

The Future of Roads is Special Paint
How about a road where the lines are painted in glow-in-the-dark paint? Or what if roads in the northern climes were painted with temperature-sensitive paint that glowed when covered in ice? (Black ice no more!) That’s the possible future of roads.

About John:John’s a geek from way back. He’s been floating between various computer-related jobs for years, until he settled into doing tech support in higher ed. Now he rules the Macs on campus with an iron hand (really, it’s on his desk).

Creating depends on having a mind quiet enough to allow ideas to bubble up. Living a successful, healthy life as an artist requires that your self-talk align with your goals and your aspirations. Your job is to quiet your mind and extinguish negative self-talk. These are your two most important tasks if you want a shot at your best life in the arts. Here are some handy tips:

1. Recognize that you are the only one who can get a grip on your mind. There is no pill to take. There is no one to consult. There is nothing to read. You must mind your mind. You can let your thoughts do whatever they want and go off in any direction, or you can say, “No, that thought doesn’t serve me.” Only you can do that work.

2. Recognize that you do not have to accept, tolerate, or countenance a thought just because you thought it. You may have the thought, “Wow, John really made me angry at work today!” Then it is your choice whether to brood about John or whether to get on with your novel. It may be easier to brood about John than to write your novel, so you may have powerful reasons to stay angry. It’s your choice.

When we say something to ourselves like “My novel stinks” or “I won’t play well tonight,” we believe that thought just because we thought it. But many of our thoughts are simply not true, and even if they are true, they may not serve us.

3. Listen to what you say to yourself. If you can’t hear your own thoughts, you can’t get rid of the ones that aren’t serving you. If you can’t admit to yourself that you are constantly thinking that life is a cheat, that you’ve badly disappointed yourself by wasting so much time, or that you hate to be criticized, you won’t be able to dispute and extinguish those thoughts. Yes, it can be extremely painful to admit to them, but it is better to grapple with them than to let them cycle endlessly.

4. Decide if what you are telling yourself serves you. You are not looking at the truth or falsity of a thought but rather at whether the thought is or isn’t serving you. Countless true thoughts do not serve us. All the following may be true thoughts that nevertheless do not serve you to think: “I might have written ten books by now”; “Writing a novel is hard”; “Selling a novel is hard”; “I’m not sure I have it in me either to write a novel or to sell a novel.” None of those thoughts, even if true, serve you. The only thought that serves you, if you want to write a novel, is “I am off to my novel!”

5. When you decide that a thought doesn’t serve you, dispute it and dismiss it. It can seem very strange at first to dispute your own thoughts. Yet dispute them you must. Get in the habit of saying to yourself, “That was an interesting thought. Does it serve me?” If you know or suspect that it doesn’t, dismiss it out of hand. Do not linger over it! This sounds like “That thought doesn’t serve me and I am dismissing it!” Mean it when you say it!

6. When a thought that doesn’t serve you lingers, actively combat it. Some thoughts just won’t go away. Maybe it’s “No one wanted my first novel, and my second novel is an even more difficult sell, so why in heaven’s name am I writing it?” You may not be able to get rid of this thought simply by snapping your fingers. Then do more than snap your fingers — fight the thought tooth and nail. Maybe you’ll have to write out the ten reasons why this book may be wanted. Maybe you’ll have to chat seriously with yourself about self-publishing. You must battle brooding, clinging, disabling thoughts — or else you will be thinking them regularly.

7. After you’ve disputed and dismissed a thought, think a thought that does serve you. Creating thought substitutes is an important part of the process. These substitutes can be tailored to the situation, or they can be simple global affirmations that you create once and use over and over again, such as “I’m perfectly fine,” “Back to work,” “Right here, right now,” or “Process.” Because for so many of us the default way of thinking is negative, self-critical, and injurious, we want to create and use thought substitutes that help prevent our brain from conjuring up its usual distortions and distractions.

8. Get in the smart habit of extinguishing unproductive self-talk even before it arises. Often we know when a thought is coming. Maybe you’ve been waiting to hear from an editor who said she would call on Tuesday, and now it’s Friday. You know that if she doesn’t call today, you are certain to begin thinking thoughts like “She’s never going to call,” “She’s about to reject my work,” and “I can’t stand all this waiting.” You know these thoughts are coming. So extinguish them now and replace them with “I’m spending the weekend working on my new pet project! And I won’t think about that editor until Monday!” How many times have you known that a thought that doesn’t serve you is coming and let yourself think it anyway? It’s time to stop doing that.

9. Engage in active cognitive support. This means creating the thoughts that you want to be thinking and then thinking them. These thoughts might include all of the following: “I paint every single morning”; “I’m going to succeed”; “I know how to make meaning”; “I’m lavishing my love and attention on my current painting”; “I’m not afraid of process”; “I show up”; “I take the risks that I need to take, with my work and in the marketplace”; “I am creating a body of work”; “I am a painter.” You can think thoughts like these if you choose to think them.

You may never have thought about the possibility of getting a grip on your mind. I hope that you’ll seriously consider it now.

About Eric Maisel:Eric Maisel is the author of “Making Your Creative Mark” and twenty other creativity titles including “Mastering Creative Anxiety”, “Brainstorm”, “Creativity for Life”, and “Coaching the Artist Within”. America’s foremost creativity coach, he is widely known as a creativity expert who coaches individuals and trains creativity coaches through workshops and keynotes nationally and internationally. He has blogs on the Huffington Post and Psychology Today and writes a column for Professional Artist Magazine. Visit him online at http://www.ericmaisel.com.